Recently, the number of products that are compatible with Bluetooth Low Energy (hereinafter referred to as BLE) have been increasing. BLE is a communication system of version 4.0 of Bluetooth (registered trademark), which is standardized by Bluetooth Special Interest Group that is a standards body.
In BLE, a device that starts connection is called a central device, and a device that accepts the connection is called a peripheral device. For example, the central device is a terminal device (wireless communication device) such as a smartphone, and the peripheral device is a device (wireless communication device) such as a thermometer or a headphone.
In BLE, it is difficult to perform a connection from the peripheral device to the central device, and also difficult for the central device to accept the connection. In addition, the central device detects the peripheral device by receiving an Advertising packet that has been transmitted from the peripheral device.
Some connection modes are defined in BLE, and examples of the modes include an Auto Connection Establish Procedure (hereinafter referred to as Auto Connection) and a Selective Connection Establish Procedure (hereinafter referred to as Selective Connection). Each of Auto Connection and Selective Connection uses a list called a White List. The White List is a list defined by version 4.0 of Bluetooth, and in Auto Connection and Selective Connection, the address of peripheral device, the connection of which is allowed, is stored in the White List.
Auto Connection is, for example, a function that automatically performs connection of a device having an address which has been registered to the White List when the device is detected.
Selective Connection is, for example, a function that performs the connection of a device the address of which has been registered to the White List so that the device is selected by a user, an application, or the like when the device is detected.
As described above, Auto Connection does not execute processing of device selection, and the entire processing is smaller than that of Selective Connection, so that a reduction in power consumption of the central device may be achieved.
As a technology related to Bluetooth, for example, there are the following technologies.
That is, there is a technology related to a terminal device, by which connection is allowed to be performed when the radio field strength has a certain value or more in a case where Bluetooth connection is performed from a mobile terminal to the terminal device.
In such a technology, further improvement of the convenience of user authentication using Bluetooth may be achieved.
In addition, there is a technology related to a method of Bluetooth device auto pairing, by which significantly-low output electric power is used for a Bluetooth device, and the detection sensitivity of a signal of a device on which Bluetooth connection is performed is attenuated.
In such a technology, a procedure of pairing between a device and an accessory may be simplified.
In addition, there is a technology related to a device display method, by which a friendly name is obtained in the background while detected devices are displayed in a list in order of reception signal strength when addition of a device is performed.
In such a technology, the user may select a device to be added, without waiting for a friendly name to be obtained. These technologies are discussed, for example, in Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2013-190900, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No 2011-182407, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2012-191646, and the like.